lemmy.world had difficulty handling new account registration when I tried moving from Reddit in June 2023, so I tried to find/join other instances. People said "it doesn't matter which instance you join."
Oh it definitely mattered.
this post was submitted on 14 Aug 2025
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MeanwhileOnGrad
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I caught my first ban from a .ml community just the other day.
They were cheering because Niger's military dictatorship seized control of a gold mine that had been operated by an Australian mining firm.
They framed it as "noble natives throwing off a foreign oppressor" when the reality is a local oppressor is just moving in for a larger cut of the money.
They were stanning so hard for the dictatorship, to the point of outright lying and claiming that the dictator was a "duly elected representative democracy".
Fuck no, it isn't. Niger, and the Sahel states, are full-on military dictatorships. They're making a big show out of kicking out foreign businesses (which are already withdrawing due to the sanctions), and mostly kicking out or just killing foreign journalists.
Niger is actually hiring foreign mercenary groups, including the remnants of the Wagner Group. The Neo-Nazis who were mad that Russia was sending them into a meat grinder in Ukraine, so they tried a coup, that failed miserably.
Anyway, my account was banned, and my comments erased, Well, some of them. mostly the ones where I pointed out that the people will never see a dime of the gold mine's output, because dictators tend to spend on themselves first and foremost.
You should totally post that interaction here.
Tankies operate on a very simple premise. US bad. That's it, that's as far as their logic goes.
I seem to have recreated the interaction here.
As opposed to cheering on installing al-Nursa in Syria and the Taliban in Afghanistan? The people of the Sahel actually support their government, God forbid Niger wealth go to their own people instead of Western billionaires.
Niger's wealth is not going to the people. That's the whole point here. The wealth is going straight to the dictator.
As to the people supporting their dictators... You do realize they're killing the people who don't, right?
The three dictators of the Sahel states are all murdering their own citizens, if those citizens speak up against the dictator.
When General Tiani seized power there were months of protests and the harsh suppression of protests. And that's just the capital. Tiani has basically abandoned the rest of the country to Jihadists, and mercenaries who have been given carte blanche to do whatever they want so long as they kill Jihadists.
But that's just what the people want, right? Instead of an elected government. Right?
🙄
Great rebuttal, you really convinced me! I’m ready for my tent in the work camp, comrade, lead the way!
We see our own worlds collapsing, have had numerous verified leaks of times our governments and media knowingly and willfully lied to us. Nothing is going to convince anyone with this reactionary repetition of our own propaganda. Debeers and diamonds may be history, Western appropriation of others ' resources under brutal conditions aren't. But sure, "brutal military dictatorships," because they're not the regimes we installed.
It would be wrong if the US had installed these dictators, but it's also wrong that they seized power.
Why do people Stan this hard for obvious dictators? They're home-grown dictators, but they're still fucking dictators.
Do you cheer for the drug cartels who are also fighting against western imperialism? No, because they're not in it for that, they're in it for themselves and don't care about the damage they do along the way. The exact same is true of the Sahel dictators.
Fuck, Niger's dictator just made blatant theft of the treasury legal for the military back in February. The military appointed "civilian" government has no say over military budgets, and the treasury must fulfil any and all budget request with no questions allowed.
Who do you suppose funded these cartels?
Better yet, when flights were grounded for all the Western world after 9/11, what was the only flight allowed to happen?
Jumping straight to 9/11 conspiracy? Is that because you can't back up any other argument?
No one is saying the western powers are good, but that doesn't matter. We were talking about three African military dictatorships, and how that too is not good.
Specifically, in the not a good thing category, when a dictator seizes a wealth generating natural resource. Dictators tend to use slave labor in such cases, and then hoard the wealth for themselves and their key supporters.
In the two years since General Tiani seized power, we've seen the economy crash, journalists disappeared, and half a dozen other types of human rights abuses.
Mali has been worse since their military coup, with protesters gunned down in the street.
And yet, people still stan for these dictators.
You jumped to drug cartels and ignored it. You're saying what Western media, billionaire mouthpieces say. Protestors gunned down and reporters gunned down only matters in the global South. Please.
Disengage
I used the drug cartels as a contrasting example to the Sahel dictatorships. You're the one who then went completely off-topic because you seem to want to stan for dictators.
And now you want to run away because your fee fees hurt?
Also, there are no western mouthpieces talking about the Sahel dictators, because the west really doesn't care. In some ways that's actually worse.
You're such an embarrassment.
That western governments and media lie to us doesn’t make their opponents automatically honest and benevolent. It’s actually incredibly bizarre that you guys think this is a reasonable argument.
You’re welcome to cite some sources to contradict the western narrative. It probably won’t convince me since I’ve seen the lies from you all too many times now to be fooled but it would at least be more dignified than an eye-roll emoji.
Even when we've given Western sources it's rejected.
I’m sure. It’s definitely not that you guys are full of shit and have no evidence whatsoever.